Binding Blood Sample
Binding Blood
Copyright © 2020 by Daniel de Lorne
The heart of a vampire
Present Day
I
Olivier’s world shook with his roars, and the stone walls repaid him threefold. Locked in this circular dungeon in a darkness as black as his soul and strung up with his arms outstretched and his ankles shackled, he tested the limits of his power. His desiccated skin rubbed against the manacles, grating against the join between one piece of metal and another. He slammed his arms forward, pulling the chains taut. He was stronger than any man or woman alive, stronger than any beast. How could mere chains hold him, for fuck’s sake?
But they weren’t mere chains. And Aurelia had him right where she wanted.
He snarled, and the echo rebounded. An animal prowled in his voice, fettered like one for whatever purpose his sister had in mind.
She’d said he was needed and that Thierry’s time for vengeance would come. But what she said hadn’t concerned him then. He’d been too wounded by Thierry’s eagerness to destroy him—and from the weighted silence that yawned within him.
He hung suspended in this lightless cell truly alone, cold trickling down his body and through the inactive mental bond between him and his twin. Aurelia hadn’t obliterated it completely, but he had no way of reviving it. Drained of blood to feed Thierry’s bitch-whore, his brother’s emotions should be coursing through him like syphilis. The thinner the blood, the thinner the veil: that’s how it worked.
He scrabbled through himself, digging in the dirt of his inner being to find some root to nurture.
But Thierry was gone, and the blackness within was worse than the inky blackness without.
He rattled the chains again, hoping Aurelia’s power would fail, even for a second. Then he’d snap these chains and be gone from there and back to—
Back to where? Wherever Thierry had been, he’d been home.
Until his brother’s betrayal.
No. Home had never been home, just a mess of hurt: the grip of Henri’s fist on the back of his neck as he’d pinned him down; Aurelia’s smug satisfaction, pleased her brother was getting what he deserved. Ghosts crowded him and probed with their pokey fingers. They broke through the skin and gouged the infected wounds around his heart. He shifted and caved against their examination; his breath shaky as he forced it out along with their assault.
Fuck you all.
He bared his fangs, then clamped his jaw shut. What he needed was blood. Any blood. His stomach tightened the more he thought about it, thought about it the more it tightened. He fought to calm the clawing thirst. He slammed the back of his head against the stone behind him, but it wasn’t hard enough to dull the pain. The stone remained inviolate. That way offered no escape.
He’d have to hang awhile, imprisoned with his thoughts, his hunger, and the ghosts in their crowded cell.
Henri with his malice.
Aurelia with her resentment.
Thierry with his disgust.
And their mother…?
Ashes and dust. Too many people writhed inside his head like worms in muck. Besides, how could he hold a grudge when he could barely recall her face?
He let her go.
The darkness crushed him, and he fought again, testing the limits of his sister’s prison. He cursed, and a sound broke out verging on a pathetic cry before he cut it short. But it squatted in his throat, pressure building until it joined with the weeping in his heart. He strained against his bonds, snorting with the effort like some demented minotaur, scrabbling against the stone to find any leverage. He’d tear his hands off if he had to, to get out and get away. And once he was free, he’d decimate his remaining family members.
Aurelia. Thierry.
Dead.
And then?
Then he’d truly be free.
***